


Mary Mary Quite Contrary

by belovedmuerto



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Catharsis, Character Death, Death, Funeral, Other
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-02-25
Updated: 2013-02-25
Packaged: 2017-12-03 13:27:33
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,918
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/698766
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/belovedmuerto/pseuds/belovedmuerto
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>John remembers very little about the night his wife died. He’s glad of it.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Mary Mary Quite Contrary

**Author's Note:**

> Oh man, how do I even put a note on something like this? I don't know. I wrote it as catharsis, so it's very true to my own personal experience with grief, with my own memories of it. 
> 
> It's been sitting on my hard drive for months now, and I came across it and re-read it, and it felt finished, so I'm posting it. Thanks to Moony for taking a quick run through it. It hasn't been Brit-picked. Any mistakes are my own.

John remembers very little about the night his wife died. He’s glad of it.

He remembers what he’d been watching on telly. He remembers how bright the A&E was, and he remembers seeing the small room with the couches and the chairs, tucked off to one side near the double doors leading back into the A&E proper. He knows what that room is for, he’s utilized it before on the other side of this sort of situation.

He remembers stumbling out of that small room later, out of the hospital and onto the street. He doesn’t remember getting into a cab or giving the cabbie an address.

***

Sherlock is dozing on the couch when he hears the front door open, then shut softly. The door to the flat is already open, because, well, it’s less likely to get kicked in that way, isn’t it? For a moment, he’s confused. Then he hears the familiar tread on the steps and things fall rapidly into place.

_Oh. Oh no. Oh, John._

Sherlock freezes where he lays, his mind a whirlwind of _why_ and _how_. By the time John reaches the landing, he has made and discarded several theories, landing on ‘anti-rejection drugs’ and ‘heart attack’.

_Oh god_. The horror of how _wrong_ this is threatens to swamp Sherlock.

John steps through the door and looks at him. His eyes are red, but dry. He looks like a hollow shell of himself. There’s almost nothing left of what makes him John, she must’ve taken it all with her, and Sherlock’s heart breaks for his closest friend.

For long moments, they stare at each other across the gulf of the lounge that had once been theirs. John breaks the silence, his voice so soft as to be nearly unintelligible.

“Sherlock, can I--”

“Of course, John,” Sherlock replies, as matter-of-fact as he can manage. He doesn’t think he does a very good job, personally, but John doesn’t seem to notice.

“I couldn’t go back home,” he says in that same soft, empty voice. Sherlock’s heart, and he didn’t think this possible, breaks into smaller shards.

_I can’t fix this._

“Tea?” Sherlock asks, rising to his feet in one fluid motion.

John nods, shuffles across the room and drops into the armchair that Sherlock has thought of as “John’s” since the day he moved into the flat. Just like the upstairs bedroom is still John’s. Just like the electric kettle is still John’s.

Sherlock makes John a cup of tea; he’s got much better at making tea since John moved out, and he knows precisely how John takes it. He has to hold the cup in front of John’s face for forty three seconds before John notices and reacts.

“It’s decaf,” Sherlock informs him. 

John makes a face, the ghost of an expression, but accepts the cup and takes a sip. He nods, once. He turns his gaze on the liquid in the cup and his eyes go unfocused. The next thing he’s aware of is Sherlock’s hand in his face again, holding something ready to give to John, something small. John turns one hand over, palm up, and into it drops a single pill.

John looks up at Sherlock, a question in his (empty, haunting) eyes.

“Diazepam,” Sherlock informs him. “Take it. Drink your tea.” Sherlock retreats across the room and sits on the couch again.

“Sherlock, where did you--” John cuts himself off with a shake of his head. “Never mind, I doubt I want to know.”

_I got it just in case, John. Just in case the worst happens. Which it has._ But Sherlock doesn’t actually tell him that. Mycroft had only agreed when Sherlock had explained the possibilities and that he was making preparations. Sherlock has never needed anti-anxiety medication for himself.

Restless, Sherlock gets up again. He tidies the kitchen, then returns to the lounge and sits in his own armchair, pressing his fingers together against his lips and watching John sip his tea.

“Did you take it?” he asks, eventually. It’s gone half-three already and John should really go to bed; he’s going to have a very long week. Sherlock wonders idly where his garment bag is.

John holds up the pill, then tosses it back and takes a swallow of tea. He puts the cup down and stands. He sways on his feet, starts toward the stairs, then stops, as if realizing this isn’t his home anymore.

_This will always be your home, John._

“Your bed is where you left it, John.”

John nods, climbs the stairs and disappears. Sherlock hears the door open, but not shut again. He listens to John moving around and eventually getting into the bed. He waits a few more minutes before he rises and follows, silent.

John is curled up on his bad shoulder in his bed, as close to a ball as he can make himself, staring at nothing in the dark. He doesn’t react when Sherlock enters the room. He doesn’t react when Sherlock climbs over him and stretches out, close but not touching, and folds his hands over his stomach.

But he does murmur “Thanks,” into the dark. Sherlock doesn’t answer him.

***

Sherlock wakes up later on, after the sun has risen, and for a brief moment he isn’t sure why. Then he realizes that John is shaking before him; he’s shaking because he’s sobbing. They’d both moved in their sleep and are lying facing each other. John’s head is bowed and his fist shoved in his mouth to try to stifle the terrifying little keening sounds he’s making, his eyes squeezed shut to try and staunch the tears.

Sherlock scoots closer and puts his arms around his friend and tries to squeeze the sobs out of him. After a few moments, John makes a strangled sound and puts his arms around Sherlock, tucking his head down and crying into Sherlock’s shoulder.

They both eventually fall asleep again, clinging to one another.

(John remembers this, but in the way one remembers a nightmare, distant and fuzzy. He’d rather remember his actual nightmares, frankly.)

***

Sherlock makes more tea, listening intently while John takes a shower and rummages through his old wardrobe for a clean shirt. There are still a couple there, despite the fact that he hasn’t lived at Baker Street for several years now. Well, and also Sherlock had stolen a couple here and there, to make sure John had clean clothes at the flat. Just in case. 

Sherlock believes in preparedness. (He makes toast as well, while he listens to John getting dressed.)

He watches closely as John eats two toast wedges, sips his cup of tea. He doesn’t push John to eat more, even though normally John would. These are not normal circumstances.

“I have to go home,” John says, eventually. There’s nothing in his voice, nothing at all. It is only marginally stronger than it had been when he’d arrived.

“Yes,” Sherlock agrees, sipping his own tea. He sits across from John and waits. He hopes that John will say something, but he’s going with John even if John doesn’t ask.

“Sherlock, do you think--” _Would you please come with me?_ Sherlock translates in his head. He speaks John Watson fluently, at this point. He has done for years.

“Yes,” Sherlock replies.

“Would you mind, maybe--” _Please don’t leave me alone right now._

“Of course, John. Whenever you’re ready to go.”

***

It’s the phone call to Harry that’s the worst, which John hadn’t expected. Mary’s parents certainly don’t take it well, but it’s her father that John speaks with, not her mother. Thankfully. They let John know that they’ll be in town by tomorrow and assure him that whatever he’d discussed with Mary will be fine. He offers them the spare room at the flat, and they gratefully accept.

Sherlock can half-hear her father speaking as he sits next to John, supposedly reading a book; close enough that their shoulders brush together when John shifts uncomfortably. Mostly Sherlock is just sticking close because it feels like what he should be doing. They’re in the cozy, bright sitting room in John and Mary’s flat, surrounded by their life together. The flat even smells like her. 

The bed isn’t made, and it doesn’t take Sherlock long to deduce how the previous night had gone. He shuts the door to the bedroom quietly while John is in the kitchen. If John noticed, he didn’t say anything.

She’d just been released from the hospital two days ago. Her first follow-up appointment with her transplant team had been scheduled for this morning. 

The kidney she’d waited so long for wasn’t even viable anymore; it took her a month of waiting post-surgery for it to wake up and they couldn’t even give it to anyone else because she’d been too far gone to revive by the time they got her to hospital.

By the end of John’s not-short-enough phone call to Harry, she’s sobbing over the phone and John has a death-grip on Sherlock’s forearm. She’s probably already drunk, and at ten in the morning. John insists she sober up before she shows her face; he will not have her causing a scene.

He doesn’t say “at my wife’s funeral.” He shouldn’t need to, should he?

***

When John looks back, several years on when he’s able to, on the following week, much of it is a blur. It’s a blur of crying relatives and morbid jokes and too many casseroles and flowers that smell bloody awful and things that just aren’t right and fuss that Mary never would’ve wanted.

He will eventually be able to call it the worst week of his life, and that’s including the week after he’d got shot. Sometimes he’ll even manage a smile about it, at least around Sherlock. And Sherlock, at least, never contradicts him.

The things that he does remember clearly about that week though, he remembers with technicolor clarity.

***

Sherlock changed the sheets on his bed for him, without him ever realizing it. After Mary’s parents arrived and got settled--Mary’s mother started cooking immediately--he sat on the sofa in the lounge with Sherlock for hours, staring at what was possibly Top Gear on the telly without actually seeing it. 

At some point, Sherlock made him tea and pushed another pill on him. At some point, Mary’s parents went to bed, and he turned the telly up so he wouldn’t have to hear her mother crying. 

At some point, Sherlock rose and pulled him to his feet and led him into his room, where the bed was made and the sheets changed and the comforter was different (he hadn’t even been aware that they owned more than one comforter, but then, Mary had quite loved bedding), and John was so relieved he started crying. Sherlock didn’t say a word the whole time, just hugged him ‘til he got a hold of himself and then actually tucked him into bed. 

Sherlock looked down at him for a moment, then kissed his forehead and said “Of course, John.” He went into the bathroom and brushed his teeth and changed into his still ridiculous pajamas and climbed into the bed on the other side--on Mary’s side--and John sighed in relief and let the pill do its job and put him to sleep.

***

Everyone and their brother traipsed through the flat over that week. John doesn’t remember most of them. He knows Harry was there too much, and that she was mostly sober most of the time, but he doesn’t really remember it.

He remembers Mycroft showing up, though. Sherlock’s brother brought with him a large container of stew. It smelled wonderful, and Mycroft wore a soft look when he handed it to John.

“It’s an old family recipe,” the older Holmes said.

Sherlock leaned close as he took the container from John. “He means it’s the cook’s recipe. Our mother has never cooked a day in her life.”

“You cook?” John asks Mycroft, hoping he sounds polite as opposed to completely uninterested and only going through the motions.

“I find it comforting,” Mycroft admits. He puts his hand, briefly, on John’s shoulder, still wearing that unaccountable soft look, before leaving again.

***

Mary had wanted to be buried in the country, because as much as she loved London and loves--had loved--living there, she found the country peaceful and wanted to be buried there. John never argued with her, but they’d never actively gone looking for somewhere to be buried because that’s morbid and she had long refused to believe that her failing kidneys would do her in.

Sherlock watched him scour the internet trying to find somewhere, anywhere. Somewhere that felt right. John didn’t notice when Sherlock took his phone and left the flat for a bit, but when he came back and handed John a slip of paper with a name, a church, and an phone number written on it, he gave his friend a questioning (almost) look.

“It’s a small parish,” Sherlock said quietly, sitting down close enough to John that their shoulders brushed together, “mostly the only people buried there these days are family of the original members of the parish. It’s technically a closed cemetery. Mother wants to be interred in France though, when she passes, so that’s where Father is. So there’s... room. For Mary. If you’d like. Mother said it’s fine, and Mycroft agrees. It’s in the country, in Sussex. It’s where... well, I suppose it’s where I’ll be, eventually.” Sherlock’s voice falters and falls silent, and John stares at him for a long time before speaking.

“Mary’s not family,” he says. “Not your family, Sherlock, I can’t--”

“But you are,” Sherlock replies simply.

John can’t argue with that. He calls the manager of the small graveyard, and then calls the funeral director to make the arrangements.

***

When John actually did ask Sherlock where he’d got the diazepam, Sherlock had smiled a wry, crooked smile at him and said “Disaster preparedness.”

John can laugh about it now, and is grateful that Sherlock was there to keep him moving that week, otherwise he doesn’t have the first idea how he would have got through it all.

Sherlock slept next to him every night that week, and held him whenever he started crying, and never said a word about it.

In fact, Sherlock never offered any words of condolence or sympathy or pity at all. And John will be more grateful to him for that than for anything else. 

***

He has no idea how he got through the wake. 

Probably the really good single malt that Sherlock and Mycroft alternated in giving to him.

***

The only thing he remembers about the funeral service is Sherlock’s arm around his shoulders, holding him up while he cried in front of God and everyone.

The only thing he remembers about the gathering after the service is more single malt.

***

The worst thing about losing someone you love is getting out of bed the day after the funeral.

So John doesn’t. Sherlock sits next to him and reads the whole day, only getting up to bring him tea and toast.

***

He had found Sherlock looking at the pictures on their mantel several times that week, particularly at two photos that share a side-by-side frame. They’re from the same day; he and Mary had dragged Sherlock on a Thames river cruise for his birthday, despite it being frigid. It had been John’s idea, mostly because he knew Sherlock would outwardly hate it but secretly enjoy the people watching and deducing the tourists.

And, contrary to what he loudly proclaimed especially when she was in hearing, Sherlock actually enjoyed Mary’s company. John would hesitate to call them friends, but only just.

He has no idea what Mary did or said, but after his initial horrendous and rude reaction, sometime around the same time he and Mary got really serious, Sherlock and Mary seemed to come to an understanding and warmed to each other to an almost worrying degree.

The first picture is of John and Mary, heads together, smiling happily. Sherlock had taken that one, and he’d been smiling when he’d done so. The second one is of all three of them, and at the last moment both John and Mary had turned and kissed Sherlock’s cheeks. The surprised happiness in Sherlock’s expression, despite the fact he was mid-eye roll, was the reason Mary had insisted on framing the photo. Sherlock always hid it when he came over for dinner.

He didn’t hide the photo that week, but the whole frame disappeared at some point, and John was hard pressed to remember when.

***

He remembers being sat on the bed--his bed--next to his open bag (that he doesn’t remember packing) and becoming aware that Sherlock was standing in the doorway watching him.

“Mary said,” he started. He had to stop for a few minutes before he could speak again. “She said it a while ago, that if anything happened to her, I should move back in here.”

“She told me,” Sherlock replies quietly. He’s not sure John even hears him.

“She said you’d take care of me.” John looks up at his friend and smiles with less bitterness than one would expect. “She didn’t really know you very well, did she?”

“I will,” Sherlock says simply. He pushes off the doorjamb and turns to go back downstairs. “There’s tea on if you’d like. Don’t sit up here all day, yeah?”


End file.
